Alaska Atmos Rewards Updates: Choose How You Earn Goes Live This Week, a New Transfer Partner, and More

Alaska Air Group, the parent of Alaska Airlines and Hawaiian Airlines, is hosting its annual Investor and Media Day at its Seattle headquarters, where it’s sharing the details of its so-called Alaska Accelerate initiative.

It includes significant investments across many aspects of the airline, including loyalty, credit cards, onboard experiences on both airlines, and more.

There’s a lot to discuss from the event. Here, we’ll take a look at the details of changes coming to Atmos Rewards, including the full implementation of the long-awaited Choose How You Earn feature for achieving elite status, the introduction of a new card product, and an exciting new transfer opportunity coming soon.

Choose How You Earn Rolls Out October 1

One of the most anticipated features of the revamped Atmos Rewards program is Choose How You Earn, which will allow members to select how they would prefer to earn elite status via 3 methods:

• Distance traveled: Earn 1 point for every mile flown.
• Price paid: Earn 5 points for every eligible $1 spent.
• Segments flown: Earn 500 points for every flight segment.

When the Atmos Rewards program launched last year, this was the feature we were most excited about, but it faced a long delay. A few weeks ago, some members noticed the option had launched within their Alaska accounts, but it wasn’t yet available to everyone. Now the feature goes live for all members as of October 1, 2026.

However, note that while members will be able to select their status-earning method as of October 1, earning under the selected method won’t begin until January 1, 2027.

Members can select an earning method once per calendar year, though it’s not required to participate or earn toward elite status. If no method is selected, it will default to the price-paid method.

Unfortunately, some details still remain unknown, chief among them being how earnings will work with partner airlines. We don’t yet know whether the selected earning method will apply to partner flights or whether a separate earning scheme will apply to these flights. We hope to receive more information on this point very soon, as it will likely affect which earning method is best for many members.

Atmos Debit Card Coming, Business Credit Card Gets Updated

While full details have yet to be shared, Alaska Airlines will release a debit card in early 2027. It will offer “high-value benefits,” such as flight and onboard purchase discounts, points sharing, the ability to pay some account fees with points, and no foreign transaction fees.

Preregistration for the upcoming debit card is available here, and we expect to learn more details soon.

Next, the Atmos™ Rewards Visa^® Business Card is set to get a refresh later this year. Benefit highlights include 10x earnings on eligible purchases made via Atmos Rewards for Business, lounge passes, free same-day confirmed flight changes, and more. Alaska says more details will be released later this fall.

More Transfer Partners Are Coming

Perhaps most exciting of all, Alaska Airlines Atmos Rewards plans to expand its roster of transfer partners, which currently has just 2 programs:

• Bilt Rewards (1:1 ratio)
• Marriott Bonvoy (3:1 ratio with a 5,000-point bonus for every 60,000 Bonvoy points transferred)

Starting in 2027, some Bank of America cardholders will be able to transfer points earned on their cards to Atmos Rewards. Alaska’s relative lack of transfer partners has long made it hard to earn Atmos Rewards points, despite them being among the most valuable in the industry. Adding a major transfer partner is undeniably good news for customers and will certainly make the eligible Bank of America products much more appealing. We don’t yet know which cards will be eligible for transfers, nor what the ratios will be, but we expect to learn more soon.

Even better, Alaska said that it also “plans to add points-transfer opportunities with other select global financial institutions,” indicating it has plans for even more transfer partners in the future. We’d certainly be thrilled to see Alaska add a program like Amex Membership Rewards or Chase Ultimate Rewards to the lineup, but that remains to be seen.

Other Atmos Improvements

On top of the exciting developments shared above, Alaska Airlines has made further tweaks to the Atmos Rewards program and the customer-facing travel experience.

First, it’s expanding the Atmos Communities program. This feature offers members “communities” that align with their interests, travel style, and more. When a member joins a given community, they can take advantage of a set of specific perks and benefits, such as free checked bags, flight discounts, partner offers, bonus elite-qualifying points, and so on.

Right now, there are 2 communities available: Club 49 and Huakaʻi by Hawaiian. As of October 1, 2026, the list will expand to 6 after the addition of the following communities:

• Global Locals
• Families on the Go
• Culinary Journeys
• Active Escapes

The airline is also adding more perks for Atmos Platinum and Titanium members. Starting November 2, 2026, these flyers will be able to bring eligible children and a companion into Premium Class free of charge, subject to available space.

Finally, members can watch for an updated activity page in their Atmos Rewards accounts that will make it easier to track earning activity and progress toward elite status, as well as access their benefits. This update is slated to roll out later this year.

Final Thoughts

There’s a lot happening at Atmos Rewards. We’re most excited to see the Choose How You Earn feature finally roll out to all members this week and for the addition of a transfer relationship with certain Bank of America credit card products coming next year. Taken together, it’s great to see Alaska Airlines continuing to invest in the Atmos Rewards program and striving to keep it valuable for its members.